


Slán Abhaile

by ach_ficsean



Category: Sons of Anarchy
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-03-20
Updated: 2015-03-20
Packaged: 2018-03-18 18:09:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,242
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3578973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ach_ficsean/pseuds/ach_ficsean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A woman from Chibs' past comes to stay with Chibs and Juice in Charming. While helping her confront her IRA demons, they also risk exposing their relationship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Slán Abhaile

            Chibs is nursing his final Bushmills and keeping a lazy eye on Juice who was had too much energy since they got back this morning - the kind of energy that leads to bad decisions: fisticuffs and sad shags. He sees her first, then, his eyes trained on the space Juice is occupying. She appears just to the left of the jumpy, tattooed Puerto Rican in the dim, dusty light of the clubhouse door. She is more back lit than lit - parking lot a glaring white behind her; but Chibs is sure he'd know her anywhere. Knows her now.

            She has leather duffel hung from one shoulder and a sweatshirt clutched in her free hand like a weapon, or maybe, a shield. Her hair, dark brown and streaked blonde this late in summer, frames her face in wild waves. Chibs is struck dumb, his mouth agape over his glass and his free hand a fist on the bar top. She doesn't move and Chibs can't.

            It's only Jax's growl from the darker, far end of the bar that jerks at Chibs enough to get him standing. And, of course, Jax knows her too, knows her from a lifetime ago. From Chibs showing up on the Teller doorstep broken and her, younger than Jax and frailer in every way, in tow. Jax tosses a coaster at Chibs' head, "Eloise?"

            Chibs nods and sucks a breath in. She's still standing at the edge of everything, hunched and looking all of nineteen again though she is pushing thirty, now. "Shite." He forces himself towards her and the movement startles her.

            "Filip." Whatever Irish she had in her voice has long since been erased, but his name, as always, lilts out like a song.

            "Aye, darlin'." He crosses the distance in long, loping strides, bumping Juice - his shoulder, to Juice's chest - on his way. "You okay?" He opens his arms once he's close enough and she collapses against him shaking her head. He hugs her tight and then, feeling her flinch and stiffen, more loosely. "El."

            While they're hugging, Juice sidles up, still buzzing with that same nervous energy. "Okay?"

            Chibs lays his head atop hers so he can get an eye on the lad. "Could use a ride."

            Juice nods and cracks a half grin - happy to be useful but still, always, wary.

            To Eloise, while Juice fetches the van, Chibs whispers comfort and nonsense platitudes. She just holds on. Finally, he says "Juice is okay," and pushes her back a step so he can get a proper look at her. She has a swollen cut across her left cheekbone and fingerprint bruises in a gruesome necklace above her collarbone. Chibs feels an old anger begin to bubble up and he has to bite the inside of his cheek to keep it in check. Outside, Juice honks once and Chibs says, "Well then, home with ye." He takes the duffle up and slips an arm around her, guiding her out and into the club van.

 

            He has known Eloise almost her entire life - met her while he was making a home with Fiona in the flat below El's, while upstairs Eloise finished arithmetic problems and said her prayers. In the tower blocks, you knew your neighbors, they were either friend or spy - **_you_** were either friend or spy. He knew her father, Daniel Knox, who wasn't just a friend but a fucking **_soldier_**  and El was someone he learned to keep an eye out for - protected, beloved and troubled.

            It's a long history, from before his scars, to after his excommunication. He has seen her grow, and change, and he knows all the parts of her - from the tiny punk neighbor nipping at his heels to a leggy seventeen year old, smoking weed and interested in more than just his heels. He'd turned her down then, 15 years her senior and feeling vaguely gross about but flattered by the crush. She'd turned to her father's IRA, after, for the dangerous love they'd all become addicted to and he never forgave himself for that.

 

            Juice parks the van around back of Chibs' house and then parks himself on the couch. Chibs tosses him a beer and turns to the kitchen, to the lovely problem curled up at his breakfast table. "Cuppa, love?" He hangs his cut up and drapes his leather jacket over her shoulders. He puts the kettle to boil and sets about getting mugs and milk and honey. For several long minutes, the only sounds are the dull clack of dish to counter and the low hum of whatever show Juice is plugged into.

            "I'm sorry," she says eventually and Chibs huffs.

 

            There is a lot to be sorry for, on both sides - put enough years down between a pair and there are bound to be mistakes, scars, and ancient aches. He's sorry he let the IRA swallow her up and sorry he didn't do more, couldn't do more when it spit her back out. In a way, Chibs feels responsible for all the ways in which she is broken. Feels responsible, even, for the acidic part of her heart that leaks on him, burns him, each and every time he gets too close.

 

            "Should I put the lad on watch?" He offers once he has a cup of honeyed tea in front of them both.

            She shakes her head and then a sly smile cracks her sullen expression. "You shagging him, then?"

            "Making jokes?" He chides but doesn't answer. He leans back in his chair to better see Juice - face down, socked feet up on one arm of the sagging sofa, head propped on his hands. Chibs can't make out his face from here, but he knows intimately the T.V. glaze softening those features. He feels a lonely pang sing along his ribcage, he hasn't properly been with the man in over a week and now this. "Ellie? You've got to talk to me, sweetheart."

            "There was - is - a guy. Callum," She says, the name filthy on her tongue. "Can I -" she jerks a thumb in Juice's direction. "Will he mind if I stay?"

            Juice will mind, in his own way. Chibs can picture, already, the pinched angst settling in the edge of the lads mouth; the stiff nod; hears the forced 'of course'; the offer, then, to piss off back to the clubhouse or his own disused, cold flat. To Eloise, Chibs says, "Whatever you need, lass," and takes her hand in his.

            Chibs loves her, has done for longer than he cares to remember. Loves her in the same strange, fierce way he loves Fiona and Kerrianne - the way he loves women who can offer nothing but distance and pain and trouble. Loves them for all of those things and for the way they thaw the parts of him that get locked up in the evil necessities of this life. "Let's not talk tonight, you look exhausted." He takes her upstairs and gets her settled on his side of the bed; talks her to sleep, his jacket still snug about her shoulders. Like Juice, she is always cold. Juice.

 

            Chibs makes his way downstairs when he's confident she won't startle awake at every small sound. Juice hasn't moved, and his breath, even and sleepy, sighs out of him with a little whistle. Chibs sits on the middle cushion and slides one cool hand beneath Juice's t-shirt, smoothing his fingers over the soft skin above Juice's hip leaving goose bumps in his wake.

            Juice shifts closer and cracks an eye open. "Hi."

            "Hi. Scoot." Chibs says quietly. Juice moves back with a confused smile and Chibs lays down half on the couch, half off with his left leg holding him up. "Fancy a cuddle and a grope?"

            Juice laughs and stretches out to kiss at the corner of Chibs mouth, shy. "Didn't think -"

            Chibs interrupts him with a low-down, filthy kiss and a slow roll of his hips against the younger man. Juice is already hard and Chibs hisses when their cocks align, heat building low in his belly and spreading. "Christ lad, to be your age again."

            Juice grins against his mouth and tugs at Chibs' belt loops until the older man is under him and between his legs. "Been wanting -"

            "Me too, me too." Chibs gets his hands down the back of Juice's jeans, palming the smooth skin and pulling him closer. "Off." In his lap, Juice shimmies - a dirty dance that gets him naked, gets Chibs hard. "C'mere." He pulls Juice in for another kiss and holds the man tight against his chest; against his mouth he can feel Juice smiling.

            "Hi." Juice whispers, again, his smile spreading into a grin. "Want you."

            Chibs nods and shucks his own jeans down, and gets a hand on their cocks. Juice shudders and his body undulates pleasantly. With his free hand, Chibs rubs Juice's ass, slides his fingers down his crack and across his hole. "Can you be quiet?"

            Juice nods, a little moan punching out of him.

            Chibs rucks his shirt up so he can get his skin pressed to Juice's. He pulls his hand from their cocks to get a pre-lubed condom from his jeans, low near his knees, folding them in half. He holds it up so Juice can see, "Enough?"

            "Yeah, yeah. I can take you. I want you. Please, Chibbie, I just-"

            "Hush." Chibs whispers, tears the condom open with his teeth, and plants a kiss on Juice to silence his begging. "I got you." He wraps his dick and pushes at Juice's shoulder until he is sat back on his haunches. "Goin' to have to help me, lad."

            "I got you," Juice parrots with a laugh before grabbing Chibs' cock, lining him up with his entrance, sinking down with a groan. "Oh."

            "Fuck." Chibs agrees. The heat gets him every time, the feeling of being enveloped by Juice is overwhelming. He gets his hands wrapped around Juice's hips, his thumbs pressed hard enough in to the V to leave bruises, the way Juice likes. "Feel good." He always wants Juice, wants him, these days, without thinking of it - a constant, steady itch under his skin. "Get moving."

            Juice uses well-muscled thighs to pull himself up and then, with steady hands clenched in Chibs' shirt, pushes himself back down. He drops his head and finds a rhythm that drives them both mad - slow, deep - rocks his hips so Chibs hits that place inside him that lights him up from the inside out.

            Chibs could live here, in the quiet of his living room, inside Juice, just their panting for sound - the outside world a far away, and meaningless place. His balls draw tight and he gets a hand around the back of Juice's neck, pulls the man to him in a kiss that is more teeth than tender. "Gonnae-" His back snaps into an arch and his world narrows to the taste and feel of Juice and then nothing, blissful nothing. When he comes back to himself Juice is a shaking mess, jerking himself frantically. "Ach, let me, let me." Chibs barely gets his hand around Juice before the lad is coming, hot stripes of cum painting them both.

            "I miss you," Juice whispers before collapsing, planting soft, wet kisses along Chibs' neck.

            "Me too, brother." Chibs says and thinks: always, I always miss you.

 

\- : -

 

            Later, Chibs has Juice settled on his side against the back of the couch. He has a cigarette lit, and an ashtray balanced on his chest. Juice is quiet, but awake, his fingers twitching in the hem of Chib's shirt.

            "Never get you naked." Juice huffs, eventually.

            "Naked enough."

            "Uh-huh." Juice snakes a hand under the cotton and along the plane of Chibs' belly. "Never enough." He finds a spot he likes along Chibs' ribs, below his heart and stills. "So . . .?"

            "Aye." Chibs puts out the cigarette and moves the ashtray above his head, on to the side table. "She's been in my life a long time, that one."

 

            He found her, when the IRA was done with her, in the Short Strand along the peace wall they'd erected on Bryson Street. He'd thought she was dead, and wasn't far off from right; and, the fear of losing her, of having already lost her, had driven him to his knees. He pulled her into his lap, her face swollen and bloody, and her skin clammy, and had rocked her to him for minutes before he recognized her breaths on his neck as a sign of life. And today, years later, he dreams that she is dead on that street and he wakes up cold.

 

            "She's in trouble with a fella, I think," Chibs says after awhile, Juice holding still beside him. "She'll be needing my help."

            "Ours."

            "Eh?"

            "Our help," Juice repeats, a little clearer, lifting his head up to catch Chibs' eye. "Whatever you need, brother."

            "I can't ask -" Chibs pulls Juice in tighter, kisses his temple. This thing between them started as sharing croweaters after long runs, and now is this: domesticated, quiet, and intense.

            "You don't have to." Juice says with a shrug and lays his head back down. "She get in trouble a lot?"

            "Often enough. She's third generation, like Fi. IRA. Tough little shite, but a sucker sometimes. Actually," Chibs smiles, pinches Juice's ass, "she is a lot like you."

 

            Juice nods off after enough silence rests between them and Chibs slides out from under him, fetches the lad's boxers from the floor and slides them into place, places a kiss at the very base of Juices spine before padding off to the kitchen. He won't sleep, can't really without Juice next to him and is too old for the couch anyways. Besides, staying up watching over Eloise, over Juice has become second nature.

 

\- : -

 

            Chibs hears El stirring around 9, stubbing her toe and swearing. Juice is still passed out, lightly snoring on the couch. He grabs his cup of tea, his fourth since Juice fell asleep around 3, and heads up the creaky, narrow stairs. He finds her, sitting on the end of his bed, her foot pulled into her lap, examining her toe. "You alright there, lass?"

            She nods, laughs, and drops the foot. She has one of Juice's Samcro t-shirts on over what appears to be nothing and he feels himself stirring, arousal hot in his belly, and has to cough to cover. She seems to take the cough as a conversation starter and sighs, saying, "Well, can I have some tea before you grill me?"

            He takes a step into the room and hands his cup over, brushes a kiss along her hairline before settling back against the doorframe. "There ye go, darlin'. So, Callum?"

            "Mm." She shifts and crosses her legs, exposes the lace edge of blue panties.

            "Christ. Couldn't find anything more to wear?" He scrubs a hand over his beard.

            She shrugs, but her face is split into a grin.

            "Death of me, love." He is smiling too.

 

            He'd barely time to stop her bleeding before he'd had her in a cargo ship out of Belfast heading to California. She'd spent the weeklong voyage in and out of consciousness, pressed against him, scared and in pain and asking him, _him,_ for forgiveness. In Charming, while they both healed, he'd taken her to bed, finally, and lost himself in her curves and soft skin. She had dulled the ache of losing his wife and daughter, and he had, he thought (hoped), reminded her that she was worthy, vital and beautiful.

 

            "Callum's IRA, 'Lip. Of course. I should have fucking -" She pulls her knees up and wraps her arms around her bent legs, making herself as small as possible. "I should have known, I, he . . . It was just nice to be with a part of home."

            "Wasn't Tacoma watching you?" She may have left him - more than once - but he'd sworn to never, ever let harm come to her again and wherever she went, he had eyes on her.

            "He was just a guy, came into my bar -"

            "You're bartending again?"

            "I _own_ the bar. I told you this, in one of the thousand voicemails I leave you because you never answer."

            This is true. He doesn't answer, doesn't listen to her messages. He hasn't learned how to hear her voice without being brought right back to the edge of heartbreak. "Aye." He shrugs.

            "I'm so fucked." She shakes her head and sips at the cooled tea. "I was -" she glances up at him, a pinch to her face, "He didn't know who I was. Christ, his face when he figured it out."

            Chibs comes off the jamb and takes a seat beside her, brushes his fingers over the bruises along her neck, ghosts a kiss over the split on her cheek. "Should have the doc take a look at this." He sighs when she flinches, suddenly exhausted in a way he wasn't expecting - bone tired and sad.

            "They're still looking for me, back home."

            "You knew that, love." They'll never be free of it, and she, a traitor, will always be hunted.

 

            She is, like him, a street urchin at heart. Raised by a single dad in the no-go New Lodge area of North Belfast, she learned from birth to grab for what you need, to lie and cheat and steal. Worse, she learned to love people for what they could offer - protection, food, a place to lay your head. Chibs learned the same life in Scotland, and when he moved to Ireland she was immediately and intimately familiar to him - the hollow eyes, the quick anger, the sharp tongue. He was raised to hate everyone, she was raised to hate the British - was taught that they, and the Protestants, had caused her soul-deep hunger. When, at 17, after her dad's death, and at her most angry; most ravenous; and, most lonely, Chibs had turned her away she had found them: The Real Irish Republican Army and their empty hope.

           

            He sends her to shower, and to get dressed, and thinks about making breakfast. If she's going to tell him how deep in she is, this time, she might as well tell Juice too and some stories should only be repeated once. Juice is already up and making coffee when he gets downstairs. "Mornin', love." He slips an arm around Juice and kisses the tattoo on the side of Juice's skull.

            "Morning. Sleep at all?" Juice is clad in boxers and a zip-up navy hoodie and there are bags beneath his eyes as if his sleep was restless and not enough.

            "I'm okay."

            "So, on a scale from one to fucked, how bad is it?" Juice asks while Chibs pulls away to get eggs, and bacon.

            "Fucked." Chibs laughs - a hollow, grated sound. "IRA."

            Juice jumps up on the counter and crosses his bare ankles. "Before you, and Abel, I had no idea Ireland was so fucking dangerous, thought it was all leprechauns and four leaf clovers."

            "Aye, there's that too." Chibs throws a smile at Juice. "She -" He interrupts himself, "Fucked indeed." He throws a pat of butter in the pan and watches it melt.

            "Eventually," Juice says, reaching for the bacon package to open it for Chibs, "you will tell me the whole story."

            "That'll take a lot longer than breakfast."

            "For you, Chibbie, I've got the time."

           

\- : -

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It took some serious digging to figure out a timeline for Chibs. One thing I ignored was, in the final season, when Chibs tells Jarry that he got his scars when he was 19. Earlier in the series, he gets them directly from Jimmy-O and I always figured that happened when he was 28 or 29. Anyways, I'll post a full timeline soon, but just know that I mapped out my whole story and Chibs' history before I posted. Thanks for reading, and commenting. - AF


End file.
